2022 Bahrain Grand Prix - Sakhir, March 18 - 20

[dialtone]

Pretty interesting quali lap comparison between Lec and Ham

Summary: the Ferrari has excellent traction and stability meaning the kerbs are a place it can find time. The Mercedes is not as stable thanks to its floor issues and top speed is hampered by the parachute wings they were forced to run to gain back some of the downforce lost from the floor issues.

If Mercedes can get the car skimming the track like the best of them, they'll be as quick as the Ferrari. The question is: how big an "if" is that?

The parachute wings, as you call them, also help in slow corners fwiw. As they fix their issues I wouldn’t expect to see the same behavior as in this video.

[Just_a_fan]

Pretty interesting quali lap comparison between Lec and Ham

Summary: the Ferrari has excellent traction and stability meaning the kerbs are a place it can find time. The Mercedes is not as stable thanks to its floor issues and top speed is hampered by the parachute wings they were forced to run to gain back some of the downforce lost from the floor issues.

If Mercedes can get the car skimming the track like the best of them, they'll be as quick as the Ferrari. The question is: how big an "if" is that?

The parachute wings, as you call them, also help in slow corners fwiw. As they fix their issues I wouldn’t expect to see the same behavior as in this video.

They do help, but if the floor is working correctly, it will do what is needed in the slow corners just as it did with the front runners.

[dialtone]

Summary: the Ferrari has excellent traction and stability meaning the kerbs are a place it can find time. The Mercedes is not as stable thanks to its floor issues and top speed is hampered by the parachute wings they were forced to run to gain back some of the downforce lost from the floor issues.

If Mercedes can get the car skimming the track like the best of them, they'll be as quick as the Ferrari. The question is: how big an "if" is that?

The parachute wings, as you call them, also help in slow corners fwiw. As they fix their issues I wouldn’t expect to see the same behavior as in this video.

They do help, but if the floor is working correctly, it will do what is needed in the slow corners just as it did with the front runners.

Pressure is inverse to the square of air speed under the floor. The floor is nowhere near as helpful in slow corners as it is in medium to high speed corners, and not linearly with speed but quadratic.

[dans79]

The parachute wings, as you call them, also help in slow corners fwiw. As they fix their issues I wouldn’t expect to see the same behavior as in this video.

They do help, but if the floor is working correctly, it will do what is needed in the slow corners just as it did with the front runners.

Pressure is inverse to the square of air speed under the floor. The floor is nowhere near as helpful in slow corners as it is in medium to high speed corners, and not linearly with speed but quadratic.

turue, but if the quick fix was to just raise the ride height, it will still be hurt severely in slow speed corners as well. Raising the ride height would make it easier for squirt or even gusts of winds to disturb the flow, and thus lead to DF instability at the rear of the car.

[dialtone]

They do help, but if the floor is working correctly, it will do what is needed in the slow corners just as it did with the front runners.

Pressure is inverse to the square of air speed under the floor. The floor is nowhere near as helpful in slow corners as it is in medium to high speed corners, and not linearly with speed but quadratic.

turue, but if the quick fix was to just raise the ride height, it will still be hurt severely in slow speed corners as well. Raising the ride height would make it easier for squirt or even gusts of winds to disturb the flow, and thus lead to DF instability at the rear of the car.

I think that's true, but aside from RedBull with the new suspension, every team had to raise ride height.

[dans79]

Pressure is inverse to the square of air speed under the floor. The floor is nowhere near as helpful in slow corners as it is in medium to high speed corners, and not linearly with speed but quadratic.

turue, but if the quick fix was to just raise the ride height, it will still be hurt severely in slow speed corners as well. Raising the ride height would make it easier for squirt or even gusts of winds to disturb the flow, and thus lead to DF instability at the rear of the car.

I think that's true, but aside from RedBull with the new suspension, every team had to raise ride height.

Yea, but they will all be affected differently depending on their floor design!

[zeph]

K-Mag a bit gung-ho after his P5 yesterday: https://the-race.com/formula-1/how-haas ... benchmark/

One swallow does not summer maketh, but it is certainly remarkable how Haas has stepped up their game. I'm glad there's a US team in F1 and hope an uptick in competitiveness will keep them around.

[dialtone]

turue, but if the quick fix was to just raise the ride height, it will still be hurt severely in slow speed corners as well. Raising the ride height would make it easier for squirt or even gusts of winds to disturb the flow, and thus lead to DF instability at the rear of the car.

I think that's true, but aside from RedBull with the new suspension, every team had to raise ride height.

Yea, but they will all be affected differently depending on their floor design!

Assumption there is that Merc is disproportionately affected by this, and every other team just barely. To me that seems a very big assumption.

[izzy]

K-Mag a bit gung-ho after his P5 yesterday: https://the-race.com/formula-1/how-haas ... benchmark/

One swallow does not summer maketh, but it is certainly remarkable how Haas has stepped up their game. I'm glad there's a US team in F1 and hope an uptick in competitiveness will keep them around.

Yes me too, and it's a good car isn't it. Where is that American driver??

[dans79]

I think that's true, but aside from RedBull with the new suspension, every team had to raise ride height.

Yea, but they will all be affected differently depending on their floor design!

Assumption there is that Merc is disproportionately affected by this, and every other team just barely. To me that seems a very big assumption.

I'm not suggesting to what extent any team is/was effected, just that they will all be affected differently. If anything the effect would be proportional to ride height, and none of us know whats the ride height of the individual cars are.

[dialtone]

Yea, but they will all be affected differently depending on their floor design!

Assumption there is that Merc is disproportionately affected by this, and every other team just barely. To me that seems a very big assumption.

I'm not suggesting to what extent any team is/was effected, just that they will all be affected differently. If anything the effect would be proportional to ride height, and none of us know whats the ride height of the individual cars are.

Totally agree with you.

[zeph]

Another great article by Mark Hughes about the potential cause of RBR's double DNF: https://the-race.com/formula-1/mark-hug ... ls-defeat/

The suspected reason for the sudden loss of power in the Red Bulls late in the race is fuel cavitation – and, if true, that’s almost certainly a function of the team’s ambitiously compressed programme.

Fuel cavitation tends to occur as the last dregs of fuel are being pumped around near-empty tanks. As can be imaged, the fuel is heavily sloshed around because of the loads being fed into the car and no matter how well-designed the tank’s baffling system, the temperature of the fuel increases when this occurs.

At a certain point of temperature the fuel begins vaporise and there will be a vapour lock in the pump, the fuel pressure dives and the pump is briefly pumping fresh air. The sudden load changes as the system pressurises and depressurises (together with the excess heat inside the pump from the vaporising fuel) will tend to damage the pumps and eventually they can no longer feed fuel to the engine.

The E10 fuel introduced this year runs at a higher temperature than the full fossil fuel previously used and so the cavitation threshold has changed. Only those teams with enough preparation time to do full race simulations in testing, including running the tanks almost dry, found this out.

Most teams did, but Red Bull – with its more compacted programme and the 11th hour performance upgrades to verify – did not. The list of parts changed overnight at Red Bull after qualifying included fuel tank lifter pumps.

If this is indeed the cause, I'm sure they'll be on top of this and it won't happen again.

[codetower]

Split screen of Leclerc / Verstappen battle

[Big Tea]

Another great article by Mark Hughes about the potential cause of RBR's double DNF: https://the-race.com/formula-1/mark-hug ... ls-defeat/

The suspected reason for the sudden loss of power in the Red Bulls late in the race is fuel cavitation – and, if true, that’s almost certainly a function of the team’s ambitiously compressed programme.

Fuel cavitation tends to occur as the last dregs of fuel are being pumped around near-empty tanks. As can be imaged, the fuel is heavily sloshed around because of the loads being fed into the car and no matter how well-designed the tank’s baffling system, the temperature of the fuel increases when this occurs.

At a certain point of temperature the fuel begins vaporise and there will be a vapour lock in the pump, the fuel pressure dives and the pump is briefly pumping fresh air. The sudden load changes as the system pressurises and depressurises (together with the excess heat inside the pump from the vaporising fuel) will tend to damage the pumps and eventually they can no longer feed fuel to the engine.

The E10 fuel introduced this year runs at a higher temperature than the full fossil fuel previously used and so the cavitation threshold has changed. Only those teams with enough preparation time to do full race simulations in testing, including running the tanks almost dry, found this out.

Most teams did, but Red Bull – with its more compacted programme and the 11th hour performance upgrades to verify – did not. The list of parts changed overnight at Red Bull after qualifying included fuel tank lifter pumps.

There has to be 1ltr left at race end, plus 3+ laps unused and fuel saved during safety car. Would this make it low enough? There could be 3ltr+ still in the tank?
Not disagreeing, I just think it quite a lot to be unusable

[wogx]